"That was possibly the worst moment of my life. We were in the middle of nowhere in Essex and the nearest hotel was a 15-minute drive. On the way I was saying to Claire, 'Just tell me what's going on?' I was begging her.

"But she didn't want to say it in front of the taxi driver. Eventually she said, 'It's Reece's dad. He's been murdered'. I was so upset."

Although Laura and Chris were no longer close, she said that there was a point where she thought he was the man she would spent the rest of her life with. Laura walked out of the relationship after two years, and said that she would have left sooner had she not been expecting Reece.

After learning of Chris's death, Laura had to decide whether to leave the show and return home to her son. After bravely sticking with the programme, Laura says she told no one what had happened, and is not even sure if Lord Sugar was aware.

"If Chris had been involved in Reece's life I'd have been home in a flash," she said, "But I thought me going back wasn't going to influence the situation."

She said the show was one of the toughest times of her life - but that she would do it all again.